


If It Wasn't For That Meddling Time Machine

by sirdefnesaur



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-04
Updated: 2016-01-05
Packaged: 2018-05-11 15:07:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5631052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirdefnesaur/pseuds/sirdefnesaur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The TARDIS meddles in Clara's and the Doctor's relationship. A recipe for disaster.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Rated for the parts I've got so far, might change in the future.

After the awful desert planet with the sand piranhas and the sand near-death and the thankfully cool evening on a date with Danny, Clara was toweling off after a nice shower when the sound of the TARDIS landing rang out in her tiny flat. She rushed out of the bathroom to catch the TARDIS materialize again in her bedroom. She froze and pulled the loose towel tighter around her frame. Had he mistaken the date again? He seemed to do that too often, lately.

The Doctor popped his head out, gave her the once over in her fluffy towels, and popped back in, closing the door behind him.

She threw her head towel on the bed and marched up to the big blue box, and knocked on the door. “Oi!” She shouted, holding up her towel with the hand not banging against the blue door. “It’s only a couple hours since you last saw me, you landed on the wrong day again!”

The door opened and he was there again, with the eyebrows and the eyes and the… flashy metal gadget in his hand. “I know,” he said, distracted. And then slammed the door in her face again.

“Hey!” She shouted. “I have to get dressed, Doctor.” No answer. “Shoo!” Nothing. She crossed her arms, glaring at the door, certain he could see her on the TARDIS monitors.

His voice drifted out from doors. “By all means, feel free.” He said, sounding distracted.

Clara scoffed. “Fat chance,” she said, loudly, turning on her heel, uncertain of what to do with the Doctor on her hands unexpectedly. 

The door opened behind her yet again and she turned back, only to be met with a a pile of books, the sonic screwdriver, psychic paper, and his jelly baby cigarette case thrust into her face. She took the items, unsteadily, losing hold on her towel but able to maneuver to keep it from falling. 

“I need you to keep watch,” He said, adding his collection of TARDIS keys on top of her too high pile, peeking over her nose. “I’ve got a thing.”

Clara’s eyebrows shot up. “A Thing? Is it an important Thing?” She asked. He wasn’t meeting her eyes, and walked around her easily as she turned to follow him.

“No, no, not at all,” He said, over his shoulder. “I’ll be back soon, no need to worry.”

Her eyebrows, now the only visible thing over the pile of books and trinkets, drew together dangerously as she followed him down the corridor. “What is the Thing, Doctor?”

“Nothing, no-thing at all.” He sounded cheerful. Too cheerful.

They were at the door by then, and he turned back to her as his hand hovered over the handle. She peeked over the books, praying silently for the towel to hold up just a bit longer. 

“Listen…” He said, hesitant. He still wasn’t meeting her eyes, and his free hand was fidgeting. “I need…” He trailed off.

“You need?” Clara asked.

“I need you to keep an eye on these,” he said, gesturing to the pile of very heavy, very uncomfortable books and objects that were already making her arms ache, “And… erm…” 

“And?” Clara supplied, her suspicion growing.

“And keep an eye on the TARDIS.” He turned away quickly, swinging the door open.

“Oh, no you don’t!” She said, moving to place down the books on the hall cabinet.

“Clara, if you try to put those down you will lose the flimsy piece of garment you’ve chosen for a dress this evening.” She couldn’t see him, but she could imagine the grin and the waving hands, all brought together with the infuriatingly charming accent.

She let out an angry, frustrated noise. “It’s not a dress, it’s a towel!” She shouted, turning her head to glare.

The Doctor shrugged. “It’s not my business what you humans wear.”

She was going to strangle him. “You can’t leave me alone with the TARDIS!” She protested, finally getting the books on a stable and even space, careful not to knock the screwdriver off the whole pile. “You know she hates me.”

“She likes you fine.” He said. “Besides, maybe she can help you pick out a new dress.”

He closed the door before the book Clara threw at him met its mark.

 

She snuck back in to her room, avoiding looking at the TARDIS, to get her clothes and dress in the hall. Armed with sweatpants and her favorite baggy Coal Hill “cadet squad” shirt, she ventured back into the bedroom with the Doctor’s ‘valuables’ and set them on the bed. She regarded the TARDIS, which was humming peacefully, her doors closed. 

Clara cleared her throat. She expected the doors to open and spew fire at any moment. She and the TARDIS had never gotten on, and she was not looking forward to spending an undetermined amount of time babysitting it. 

The TARDIS hummed peacefully, ignoring her suspicion, but Clara would not be fooled so easily. Once she had seen the machine literally glow red from the windows threateningly to warn her off. And now it was a couple meters from her bed. 

The TARDIS door opened. A warm, inviting glow pooled out into her bedroom, looking for all the world like a nice, cozy time machine that wouldn’t hurt a fly. She knew better. She wouldn’t forget the days it had taken to find her bedroom on the TARDIS while the Doctor was away, and the twenty-odd future and past selves she had met who were all searching endlessly while the TARDIS silently laughed at their misery.

But she knew that the TARDIS eventually got her way. It was up to something. As the Doctor always said, the best way to find out an enemy’s plan is to get yourself captured. She grabbed the sonic screwdriver from the bed, steeled herself, and marched forward past the TARDIS doors. They did not slam behind her, locking her in. Nor was she in one of the many “companion” rooms that the TARDIS kept on file and would occasionally trap her in to make sure she understood she wasn’t the only one. It was just the console room, with the railings and the levers and the books left around by her careless grey haired stick insect. She walked up to the console, looking up at the normally spinning gears above, expecting a message.

“What do you want?” She asked. 

The soft whirring of the engines continued unchanged but one of the monitors flickered on, and the Doctor’s voice rang out in the empty room. “…Have no lasting effect…”. Clara walked cautiously around the console to the monitor, which was showing her the console room, as seen from above. She gripped the handles on the monitor. The Doctor was circling the console walking towards… her. From the past. She remembered this from… “Wh- Are you kidding?” Past-her was saying. The Doctor replied, “Of course I’m kidding. It’s a time machine, not a miracle worker.” She watched herself roll her eyes and turn away from the Doctor, as he followed with a “Bye-bye”. She spun on her heels. “See ya!” she called, over her shoulder. This was a week ago, after their bank robbery. Past-her continued: “Don’t rob any banks!”

The Doctor countered with, “Don’t rob any banks what?” She smiled, watching them. “Without me.” Past-her replied. “‘Course not, boss.” the Doctor said, and past-her smiled before leaving. She was confused. 

“Why are you showing me this?” Clara asked, looking back up at the console. No reply but the hum, which was starting to sound like a purr, from the engines. The footage, if that’s what it was, continued. The Doctor turned back towards the console, talking to himself. “Robbin’ a bank. Robbin’ a whole bank.” Clara frowned at the pride in his voice, his ego was uncontrollable as always, but then: “Beat that for a date.”

The feed on the monitor looped back to the sound of the door closing behind Clara, then looping back once again after “Beat that for a date.”

Clara’s hands dropped from the handles on the monitors. 

The first time back on the TARDIS after his new face, he’d told her that he wasn’t her boyfriend. She’d never doubted it- nor had she thought in the first place, though she fancied him. With this new information- information she couldn’t fully trust, mind you, considering the source, Clara reconsidered. The Doctor had been consistently showing up more and more often, frequently when Clara was headed out the door for a date, ever since she began seeing Danny. Sometimes even in the middle of dates, and he always looked smug when she said yes. 

Smug… She considered it from different angles. If the TARDIS was showing her this, it was for her own agenda. Which was what, exactly? Fake a bit of footage to give her fanciful ideas, then watch as she fails to get his attention, as always?

Never mind. She wouldn’t put it past the time machine. 

It could also be the ship, in a way, trying to help the Doctor. _If_ the footage was genuine, maybe the TARDIS was trying to set them up or something, for the Doctor’s happiness. 

She put her hands on her hips and regarded the console like a student who’d been snickering the entire class.

There were many possibilities. The fact that the Doctor took out his books and screwdriver and keys to give to her to watch could be because there was something wrong with the TARDIS. Or maybe, there was something wrong with the Doctor, he’d been replaced by a Zygon, because the _real_ Doctor wouldn’t be jealous of her going on a date. Would he?

She threw up her hands in exasperation. It occurred to her the TARDIS could have given her this information for no other reason than to mess with her head, and if that was the case, it was undoubtedly successful. She spared one last glare for the console before turning and walking out. The TARDIS door closed quietly behind her.


	2. Chapter 2

With the TARDIS on her hands and the Doctor out being mysterious, Clara was confined to her flat for the night. She put in an order for groceries she’d intended to go out and buy, put the kettle on and placed the Doctor's collection of valuables on the bookshelf in the living room. She switched on the telly, eager for a distraction from what she'd learned only 10 minutes ago, but even the mind-numbing night programming wasn't keeping her thoughts off the revelation.

Before the Doctor, Clara was organized. She was still organized, of course, but before him, she was fully organized, 100%, even when everything was a bit messy. Everything had its own category and place and purpose, things were definite. She had plans, and even when those plans didn't go according to, well, plan, she made new ones. When her year of travel was unexpectedly cancelled and she chose to look after the Maitland children, she still kept her life in order. She didn't know when her care of the children would be over, exactly; that was up to the hiring of a new nanny. But in the meantime she kept a tight budget, managing to save even more money while also adding some locations to her upcoming trip. Clara was able to lay out plans for the future and keep everything organized. Under control.

But the Doctor was a wrench in her plans she couldn't work around, chaos itself in a floppy haircut and bowtie. He offered her whole new worlds and galaxies and times and places, infinite possibilities unfurling beyond the doors of his big blue box. There was no way she was ever going to say no to an opportunity like that.

Like every other wrench in her life, her travels with the Doctor were subjected to Clara’s control- only on Wednesdays. But beyond that, what they would see, where they would go was usually a spur of the moment decision by either of them. Usually they had fun adventures and helped save people, but sometimes it was painfully clear she was in over her head: pocket universes, inter-species treaties, the great and terrible Time War. Despite this, her travels were, in her mind, organized. A little unexpected at times, but they fit neatly into the category of her hobbies. 

The Doctor himself, on the other hand, was a different story. She’d never met anyone like him. And not just the, y’know, alien thing, but his knowledge and compassion and kindness and fury and big hopeful eyes and-

She sipped her tea.

But the thing about the Doctor was, and the thing about their relationship was, she couldn’t put it in a neat little box. She couldn’t categorize it. She’d tried, and it’s like he knew, because he absolutely refused to be nailed down. When they first met, he’d asked her to get inside what she thought was a very small box, with him. Of course she’d assumed he was flirting. 

And sometimes he definitely was. The one before the one she was with now, the one with the bowtie, most of the time he sold the totally-don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-about-of-course-I’m-not-flirting act well, but there were times he knew and she knew what they were doing. He was tactile, always with hugs and hands in her hair and spinning her around the TARDIS and the universe. They were building up to something, something was inevitable, so she’d let it happen and for once, waited to see how it’d play out instead of trying to define it.

So she’d relaxed, and put her own feelings at the back of her mind, waiting for something to happen that would define what they were to each other. Of course, sometimes the feelings got ahead of her. She told her family she had a boyfriend. She was out of options, she had told herself, it was either him or Adrian, and she didn’t want to give Adrian any ideas. But then the Doctor seemed to be thrilled at the idea of being her boyfriend, normally, not for family, not for Christmas, not for pretend. 

And then he changed. 

Clara switched off the telly and stood, making her way to her bedroom for reading. Reading, that’s a better distraction. She avoided the TARDIS, which was parked on the right side of her bed.

Reading was a terrible distraction. Her eyes slid off the page of her giant Jurassic Park, the 200th anniversary edition, in the first sentence, and she found herself looking at the big blue box next to the bed. The lights inside were dimmed, as if it were sleeping. She nearly scoffed. Didn’t fool her, one bit.

The Doctor changed, and suddenly he was distant- he forgot her name, he left her (three times!)  and it was only because of some advert in the paper that she’d ever seen him again, at all. He didn’t like hugs, but he still wanted her around. And most importantly, he was not her boyfriend.

His words, not hers. He’d said that to her when they were back on the TARDIS, redecorated with books and chalkboards and round things. Clara, I’m not your boyfriend.

And that was it. It was organized. Their relationship, once and for all, in a nice neat box: _not your boyfriend_. She didn’t mourn it or anything, he was a 2,000 something year old alien, the chance of it ever- of them ever-

She closed the book with a snap and swung off the bed.

 _And then it was organized_. He wasn’t her boyfriend, and that was it. That’s what _he’d_ wanted, that’s what _he_ told her. She was pacing now, in front of the bed. He’d decided! For once in her life, she’d left things up to somebody-freaking-else, and he’d decided. 

So three weeks later, she’d asked out the cute new teacher, because why the hell not. She wasn’t going to pine for the I’m-not-your-boyfriend Doctor, after all, _he’d decided_. Danny was sweet, he was funny, he was wonderful, he was shy, he was-

He wasn’t the Doctor.

Clara sighed and sat on her bed. If what the TARDIS showed her was real, that the Doctor was, somehow, jealous of her dates, she-

She didn’t know. Clara sank back into bed, wrapping the covers around her. She held her Jurassic Park book close. Why say he’s not her boyfriend and then be jealous when she got herself one? It’s almost as if he didn’t want to let her in close enough, but didn’t want her to get close to anyone else either. That would be incredibly, _horribly_ selfish of him. 

He’d called himself selfish before, to warn her off, but she’d never believed it. Now she understood. The humans, the companions that he invited into the TARDIS, he did so because he needed them. But it was selfish to steal them away from their lives.

But she wanted to be taken. She yawned, curling up against her book. She’d wanted..

 

Clara blinked awake, slowly, to the sight of the Doctor standing over her bed, staring down at her with a worried expression. She woke fully with a shout, throwing her pillow at him furiously. He dodged the projectile expertly.

“What the hell are you doing??” Clara shouted, throwing another pillow, only for him to catch it. 

“You were making a terrible noise,” The Doctor said. “I was making sure some lumbering beast hadn’t accidentally fallen into your mouth and made its home there.”

“Get! _Out_!” Clara yelled, and the Doctor grinned as he got in his TARDIS. The sound of the TARDIS taking off followed shortly.

Clara sighed, falling back onto the bed. Now that he was gone she knew he’d riled her up to avoid talking about why he’d landed in her apartment, what the Thing was. He knew her too well. She checked the time on her nightstand: 6:20am.

She threw off the covers and walked to her living room, to the bookshelf where she’d put his valuables. The sonic screwdriver and psychic paper were gone, as well as one of the TARDIS keys, but the rest was there. 

Feeling owed at least this, she put the keys to the side and decided to flip through the books he’d left. She had plenty of time before she had to get ready for work, after the study at Oxford, her school was one of many to move first classes to start at 10:00am, rather than 8 or 9. She gathered the books in her arms and set them down on her small portable table in the kitchen. 

Clara prepared breakfast, crepes and jam because she deserved it, and poured herself some tea before sitting down in front of the pile of books on her table.

Some she recognized. One was the diary of River song, which the Doctor had retrieved from the library planet. She set that one aside, she knew it was almost entirely in the past for the Doctor and she had no chance of finding out something he didn’t, but it was River’s private thoughts and therefore none of her business. Another was the history of the Time War, which she’d read a few pages of that time in the TARDIS library in a timeline that never happened. She set that in a different pile, apart from River’s diary.

Another book was a scrapbook, and this one she’d heard about: Amy and Rory’s collection of the Doctor appearing in books, movies, news, etc. Of course he’d keep this. The ego on him, really. She set that on the pile with the history of the Time War.

One by one, she went through the rest of the books, until she came to one that was locked and covered in chains. She tried to pull it open anyway, with no luck. The book had a grey, faded cover, but the pages looked fresh inside. It was covered in small, flat metal chain that encased it fully, allowing no leverage to open it without a key to the padlock. The padlock itself was ornate, covered in what she knew was Gallifreyan, with no hole for a key.

She shrugged and put it on the pile with River’s diary. The rest, which were various histories of the Doctor or the people the Doctor knew, as well as Bridget Jones’s Diary (her recommendation, though she had no idea why it was in his collection of valuables) went into her bag for school. She’d read them between classes.

And then after school, she had a date with Danny. Clara chose not to think about whether or not the Doctor would show up, like he had done for the past weeks, to steal her away from her date. 

She set out a nice dress, with shoes that she could run in, if she had to.


End file.
